| Unbridled Spirits is a
vibrant and authoritative study of the women of the seventeenth
century, women whose voices have been lost until now. Stevie
Davies resurrects forgotten texts to bring to life prophetesses
who predicted the fall of the king and the rise and fall of
Cromwell; Peace Women who marched against the war; Leveller
women who condemned oppressive legislators and abusive taxes;
Fifth Monarchists who attacked the government; separatist
women who founded dissenting churches and spoke for liberty
of conscience; and radical Quakers who stood for gender and
class equality.
This remarkable book shows how these revolutionary women
found means to make their voices heard at a time when vociferous
women were seen as a plague and a threat to society; when
a woman's lot was to work hard, bear children and obey her
husband. Speaking out, writing and demanding change took
immense courage in the days when accusations of witchcraft
were still rife, and when a woman could be publicly humiliated,
ducked or bridled merely for scolding her husband, neighbours
– or government.
In scorching prose, Stevie Davies plunges us straight
into the drama of seventeenth-century England and the political
turmoil of a country turned upside-down by the execution
of its monarch. She provides a searing document of women's
lives during one of our most turbulent and transformative
periods of history. |
